Usually, when we do a deep dive on a company, its strategy, and its prospects, we refer to lots of numbers; after all, that’s how the score is kept. But in Microsoft’s case, it is almost uniquely not about the numbers, even when the numbers are terrific, or poor. Microsoft’s story is, ironically enough, analog, not digital.

For years, Microsoft’s stock price (and market cap) have been determined not by its numbers, but by its strategy and related prospects. This is how we’ll look at Microsoft in this issue.